Do you struggle to decide which of your many writing ideas to pursue? In this video, I share my powerful NIA model for evaluating story concepts and determining which ones are worthy of your time and effort.
Whether you’re writing your first short story or are a seasoned author, this practical approach is a surefire way to help you focus on your most promising ideas.
Jane Cleland here. I have a lot of ideas. Now what? How do I decide which one or ones are worthy?
I have a model for that. I call it NIA. There are three considerations that, taken together, should help you sort through and decide which among the ideas are, in fact, most useful. The N stands for novelty, the I for intrigue, and the A for alignment.
NIA:
Novelty: Is it truly a new idea? Is it fresh? Otherwise, it’s going to read as derivative, and who’s going to want to publish that?
Intrigue: Is it big enough? We don’t want to write little things. We want to write big, thought-provoking things with global scope, global reflections, or something big.
Alignment: Does it align with your reader expectations, working in whatever genre you are thinking of writing in?
So:
N: Make sure it’s new—novel.
I: Intriguing—big.
A: Aligned with reader expectations based on genre.
I know you can do it, and I’d love to hear your thoughts about it. How do you decide which ideas are worthy? Put your thoughts in the comment section—I’d love to read them.
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